I posted this in the cablevision thread but thought i'd repeat it here (if a mod wants to delete the dup please do so):

Ok doing a little research i found the following (some of this has been posted on this and other forums). I'm putting 2ish and 2ish together to get 4ish. If anyone sees some fault to my logic please let me know.

The increase from 750 to 870 in and of itself represents bandwidth in which they can transmit another 40 HD broadcast services at a full 19+ Mbps, should they choose to use all of it that way. (Not nearly every available HD service comes from its provider at anything close to a full 19+ Mbps--I recently spot-checked Universal HD on TWC SD and was surprised to find it to be apparently variable-rate from about 7-10 Mbps and it looks incredibly good). There must be services that they provide now which they're free to move off the lower 870 and into that upper 130 (business high-speed internet and telephone, perhaps, where they can replace the equipment at a couple thousand subscriber sites fairly quickly and inexpensively).

I'm certainly not saying that they'll be able to hold off going to SDV forever, just longer than the other providers who haven't upgraded to 1GHz.

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Mike Scott

"To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts." -- hookbill

I posted this in the cablevision thread but thought i'd repeat it here (if a mod wants to delete the dup please do so):

Ok doing a little research i found the following (some of this has been posted on this and other forums). I'm putting 2ish and 2ish together to get 4ish. If anyone sees some fault to my logic please let me know.

Cablelabs runs their certification through "waves". Taking a look at their certification schedule we can infer:

The submission could have (unlikely) made the April 21 - 23 slot for submissions which would mean board certification on June 24 - 26.

Much more likely they made the CW61 Wave with submission due by June 12th...

Therefore we may expect to see the boxes sometime after the Aug 14th Board meeting. How long for cable carriers to distribute is anyone's guess.

CableLabs held an interop at the beginning of April to which both TA vendors and TiVo brought protos. Both Motorola and SA claimed to have come through that interop well and to be submitting units into Cert Wave 60 as well as to cable service providers for internal testing (links to articles about these things are in old posts from mid-April-to-mid-May). It doesn't much matter, since in any case everyone will be missing the original by-end-of-calendar-Q2 estimate, which was, in their defense, an extremely long range estimate, particularly given that it was an estimate of a cooperative effort between three equipment vendors, a bunch of cable service providers and CableLabs. I don't care, so long as my cable provider doesn't roll out SDV services much before they're ready to make a TA available.

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Mike Scott

"To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts." -- hookbill

Thanks for the info.. i searched but couldn't find that post. Cablevision , Westchester N.Y. made the switch a week ago which i s why I have a vested interset in the details.

What kind of equipment is Cablevision using in your area? Cisco/Scientific-Atlanta or Motorola?

I won't track down all of the info for you (and we discussed all these PRs ad nauseam earlier in this thread), but the first mention of Cisco/SA's Tuning Adapter was here at lightreading.com on April 25th:

Quote:

Jeff Kasten, the senior product manager for product strategy and management at Cisco's newly formed Service Provider Video Technology Group, said the company plans to show off the device at next month's Cable Show in New Orleans, and expects to submit it to CableLabs for certification testing for Wave 60, which is just getting underway.

Just google "tuning-adapter wave-60" or various other keyword combos.

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Mike Scott

"To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts." -- hookbill

TWC could just as easily added those hundreds of cable channels that are rarely watched in significant numbers to SDV instead of adding a bunch of HD channels. They did not. No laws broken. That doesn't make it right.

It doesn't make it wrong, either.

First of all, they have added many SD as well as HD channels. With the exception of KMYST (Which is a local broadcast channel), all of them, whatever their bandwidth, are SDV. Most of the HD channels are much more rarely watched than the SD channels. Far less than 20% of the 300,000 plus subs in San Antonio have HDTVs, and even fewer have only HDTVs. (I myself have one plain old 25" NTSC monitor and two plain old 19" TVs in addition to the 2 HD sets I own.)

Stipulating for the moment that there is something "wrong" with excluding any subset of subscribers from content freely available to all other subscribers, how would it have been "better" to actually take away large numbers of channels from 240,000 subs so that 60,000 subs can get programming they never had before? Isn't it "better" to take nothing from any subscriber while only blocking 60,000 of their total 300,000 customers from being able to receive certain new channels? Even those 60,000 are still paying the same amount for the same number of channels they received previously, and no one has their bill increased or their channels decreased. Certainly it is not absolutely perfect, but given the technical and economic constraints and putting aside my personal desires, this seems to me about as fair as it can get for the time being.

Of course the fact is it isn't "wrong" to provide a lower level of service to certain subs if there are solid technical reasons for doing so. In particular, delivering a slightly lower class of service to customers (like S3 owners) who pay the company less for the service is perfectly ethical, provided the concomittant restriction in service is not out of proportion to the reduction in revenue. (Note: the statement is a bit over-simplistic when applied to the real situation, but the principle stands in general.) The only thing which would approach being unethical is to extract exhorbitant fees from customers who have no choice but to be customers. The power company, for examnple, to all intents and purposes is a monopoly in most municipalities and in practical terms the electricity user very nearly has no choice whatsoever but to be a subscriber. Most people do not have the luxury of not using utility power at all. A CATV subscriber can always forgo CATV altogether, and indeed something close to 40% of all households do just that.

The increase from 750 to 870 in and of itself represents bandwidth in which they can transmit another 40 HD broadcast services at a full 19+ Mbps, should they choose to use all of it that way. (Not nearly every available HD service comes from its provider at anything close to a full 19+ Mbps--I recently spot-checked Universal HD on TWC SD and was surprised to find it to be apparently variable-rate from about 7-10 Mbps and it looks incredibly good). There must be services that they provide now which they're free to move off the lower 870 and into that upper 130 (business high-speed internet and telephone, perhaps, where they can replace the equipment at a couple thousand subscriber sites fairly quickly and inexpensively).

I'm certainly not saying that they'll be able to hold off going to SDV forever, just longer than the other providers who haven't upgraded to 1GHz.

Switched Digital Video (SDV) apparently is already deployed in Cox Orange County and from what I can tell from my CableCard Tivos, at least the following are all under SDV:
(Unless otherwise indicated, tuner does not map to a frequency when channel is selected. Many of these correspond to channels Cox OC stated would go SDV some time in April which is why I believe SDV is the reason they don't tune)

True, but the one I mentioned, Universal HD, runs at 1080i on my local system (I just checked with the TiVo S-P-S-Instant-Replay-S display). The programs that I sampled were very sharp and clean. Given the resolution and average bit rate, I'd have expected a mess of "macroblocking" in high-motion scenes, but I couldn't detect any.

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Mike Scott

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Switched Digital Video (SDV) apparently is already deployed in Cox Orange County and from what I can tell from my CableCard Tivos, at least the following are all under SDV:
(Unless otherwise indicated, tuner does not map to a frequency when channel is selected. Many of these correspond to channels Cox OC stated would go SDV some time in April which is why I believe SDV is the reason they don't tune)

I'm actually pretty impressed that one of the shopping channels is switched.

They can throw all of the other shopping channels in there along with several other Spanish channels as far as I'm concerned.
Assuming this SDV channel selection trend continues perhaps I won't need TAs at all.

Time Warner Cable thanks you for choosing us as your video provider. We are writing to our valued CableCARD customers to provide advance notice of important upcoming changes that will affect your ability to watch certain channels if you use a CableCARD-equipped retail device that only provides one way service. These one way devices are also called a "UDCP".

Time Warner Cable is rolling out a new two way interactive technology known as Switch Digital Video [sic] (SDV). SDV is a particularly exciting bandwidth breakthrough that makes it possible for us to offer many additional services, including new HD channels and HD versions of popular existing channels, to our customers. SDV allows us to provide these additional services, while at the same time continuing to offer existing services, because channels delivered using SDV are only transmitted over the cable system on an as-needed basis. As a result, SDV uses system capacity more efficiently than the traditional, always-on method.

The current CableCARD compatible devices sold at retail can only access one way services. They were not designed to be compatible with SDV, which is a two way service. On July 28, 2008 Time Warner Cable will begin providing a number of our existing, less-viewed channels via SDV. Please see the reverse side of this letter for a list of these channels. This means that beginning July 28 you will not be able to view these channels on your one way CableCARD device.

We recognize the frustration this may cause you so Time Warner Cable has worked with the rest of the cable industry and TiVo Inc. to develop an external device called a Tuning Adapter that will allow certain UDCPs, including TiVo Series 3 and TiVo HD digital video recorders, to access channels delivered using SDV.

We expect to be able to offer Tuning Adapters to customers with compatible UDCP's later this year. At that time we will provide you with additional information on availability and device compatibility. It is currently contemplated that the Tuning Adapter will be provided at no additional charge. In the meantime until the Tuning Adapter becomes available, a Time Warner Cable digital cable set-top box will be required to view channels migrated to SDV. In addition, certain non-TiVo UDCP models may not work with the Tuning Adapter.

We have created a special offer to help you during the transition. Please contact us at (800) 782-6516 if you would like to learn about the offer or have other questions. Either way, we will contact you when the Tuning Adapter is available.

Overall, we're not being hit too badly at first, with a set of 45 channels, 25 of which are foreign-language channels and east-coast feeds of things where we'll still get the west coast ones non-switched. Only 5 of the switched broadcast channels are HD, two of which I had little use for (MOJO and NBA HD, the latter very rarely having content). I will miss the ability to record those "HD VIP Pak" channels in the interrim. I don't know if it's worth dropping it to save $6/month for however long its likely to be--we can still watch and record those channels on the SA8300HD (running the hideous Navigator IPG) in the meantime. I'll also miss The Tennis Channel and may well dump the "Digital Sports Pak", since that's all I ever watch on it. I suspect that any new broadcast HD channels that they add after starting to use SDV will be switched, though I could be wrong. The only HD service available now that I'm anxious to get is Sci Fi Channel HD--I'll be pissed if they add that one as switched.

I suspect that the "special offer to help you during the transition" is a discount on leased digital STBs for a limited time.

TiVo said that they expected the Tuning Adapter to be provided at no charge. Everybody doubted it, but it looks as though it might happen (someone posted in another thread--here--that Cox Pheonix sent out a letter in which they flatly stated that they weren't going to charge for the TA, whereas TWC's wording gives them leeway to change their mind ).

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Mike Scott

"To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts." -- hookbill

Overall, we're not being hit too badly at first, with a set of 45 channels, 25 of which are foreign-language channels and east-coast feeds of things where we'll still get the west coast ones non-switched. I will miss the ability to record those "HD VIP Pak" channels in the interrim. I don't know if it's worth dropping it to save $6/month for however long its likely to be--we can still watch and record those channels on the SA8300HD (running the hideous Navigator IPG) in the meantime. I'll also miss The Tennis Channel and may well dump the "Digital Sports Pak", since that's all I ever watch on it. I suspect that any new broadcast HD channels that they add after starting to use SDV will be switched, though I could be wrong. The only HD service available now that I'm anxious to get is Sci Fi Channel HD--I'll be pissed if they add that one as switched.

I suspect that the "special offer to help you during the transition" is a discount on leased digital STBs for a limited time.

TiVo said that they expected the Tuning Adapter to be provided at no charge. Everybody doubted it, but it looks as though it might happen (someone posted in another thread--here--that Cox Pheonix sent out a letter in which they flatly stated that they weren't going to charge for the TA, whereas TWC's wording gives them leeway to change their mind ).

I would be absolutely elated if TWC Cary put a similar lineup on SDV and left the rest alone. HDNet is the only thing id miss and I too have an 8300HD with crapigator that I can record it on. Speaking of HDNet, wonder what happened to Star Trek: Enterprise? I have been following it for a long time and was into the last season with about 8 more episodes to go and it disappeared... bummer.

I wouldn't expect broadcast channels to be put on SDV. As analog transmissions cease, they will become part of the CFR's "basic service tier." Stations in the tier can not be "encrypted" or "scrambled" and must be carried "in-the-clear." While the FCC is busy twiddling their thumbs, all or almost all TV sets currently being sold in this country have a clear QAM tuner. Although cablecard equipped TV sets were advertized as Digital Cable Ready, the clear QAM tuner equipped TV sets are really technical equivalent of the old analog cable ready TV sets. Having said all of that, there is no telling what TWC or the FCC will do.

While poking around looking for something else, I ran across this spec sheet for the Cisco STA1520 Tuning Adapter. The freakin' thing is officially 11.75"x8"X1.75" and weighs 2 lbs. Though we already had an idea of its size from the display at The Cable Show a month ago, it's still disappointingly large. Of course, I wasn't expecting them to optimize the size of it. I'm certain that it's based on something else they were already making, using as many of the same parts as possible. I just wished they had based it on something a bit smaller .

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Mike Scott

"To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts." -- hookbill

Time Warner Cable would like to thank you for choosing us to be your video provider. We are writing to you as a valued CableCARD customer in order to provide advanced notice of important upcoming changes that may affect your ability to access certain channels on your one-way CableCard-equipped retail device (also known as a "UDCP").

Time Warner Cable is rolling out a new interactive technology in your area known as Switched Digital Video ("SDV"). SDV is a particularly exciting bandwidth-management breakthrough that makes it possible for us to offer many additional services, including new HD channels and HD versions of popular existing channels, to our customers. SDV allows us to provide these additional services, while at the same time continuing to offer existing services, because channels delivered using SDV are only transmitted over the cable system on an as-needed basis. As a result, SDV uses system capacity more efficiently than the tranditional, always-on method. However, in order to launch all the new services our customers want, first we must migrate some existing services to SDV in order to make additional bandwidth available.

Starting on July 30, 2008, Time Warner Cable will begin providing a number of our existing, lesser-viewed channels via SDV. The list is as follows:

The current generation of CableCARD-compatible devices sold at retail are only capable of accessing our one-way services. They were not designed to be compatible with SDV, which is a two-way service. As a result, once the channels listed above are migrated to SDV, they no longer will be available to UDCPs. However, Time Warner Cable has worked with the rest of the cable industry and TiVo Inc. to develop an external devices called a Tuning Adapter that will allow certain UDCPs, including TiVo Series 3 and TiVo HD digital video recorders, to access channels delivered using SDV.

We expect to be able to offer Tuning Adapters to customers with compatible UDCPs later this year. At that time we will provide you with additional information on availability and device compatibility. It is currently contemplated that the Tuning Adapter will be provided at no additional charge. Until the Tuning Adapter becomes available, however, a Time Warner Cable digital set-top box will be required to view channels migrated to SDV -- even if you own a Tuning Adapter-compatible UDCP. In addition, certain non-TiVo UDCP models may not work with the Tuning Adapter.

That's rough. They only took 5 of our HD channels (UHD, MOJO, the HDNets and NBA HD), 4 of which were in an added-cost package. I'll miss UHD and the HDNets in the interrim, but I'll survive. They took four of those plus another 8 channels from you guys. I'd really miss ESPN2 HD, since a lot of the summer hard-court tennis season (the "US Open Series") will be covered there. I'd also be miffed about losing TBS HD (the new season of The Closer starts on 7/14), NatGeo HD and HD Theater.

They didn't even throw in "a special offer to help you during the transition" . Cheeky and unapologetic. You have my sympathies.

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Mike Scott

"To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts." -- hookbill

Comcast is expanding their SDV tests to two more cities: Minneapolis and St. Paul. They also appear to have scaled back from their original plan to deploy of SDV in 15% of their service area by the end of the year.

I was thinking that these 'dongles' or adapters are going to be offered at no cost, maybe because TiVo is footing the bill for them? Anybody know this for sure to be UNTRUE? Just a theory at now...less than a theory, more of a thought.

I was thinking that these 'dongles' or adapters are going to be offered at no cost, maybe because TiVo is footing the bill for them? Anybody know this for sure to be UNTRUE? Just a theory at now...less than a theory, more of a thought.

I believe that the no cost thing is just the cable industry being apologetic for deploying switched broadcast, when they'd commited to supporting unidirectional CableCARD. Creating and distributing the Tuning Adapter is an act of contrition which would seem much less sincere if they tried to profit from it.

Even though TiVo said that they expected cable to offer the device at no cost to their subs, I'm a bit surprised that it looks as though they might be right. Of course, at this time there are only a few hundred thousand cable subscribers nationwide who might have a use for the TA--big woo. If the FCC endorses the TA solution and the CE industry responds by creating a slew of low-end products with TA compatibility built in, demand for the thing could become a much more serious financial hit for the cable industry.

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Mike Scott

"To view links or images in signatures your post count must be 10 or greater. You currently have 0 posts." -- hookbill

I've written a few people and CC'd the head of the Rochester, NY office but no response yet. I know we were unfortunately one of the first areas to get SDV so I would think they should be testing the dongle early.